


Barriers

by Twenty_One_Grams



Category: The Evil Within (Video Game)
Genre: Action & Romance, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, Marked Explicit for future chapters, Post-Canon, Road Trips, With a hint of humour, darkish, post-union
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-06
Updated: 2019-01-04
Packaged: 2019-05-03 00:30:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14556948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Twenty_One_Grams/pseuds/Twenty_One_Grams
Summary: For six years, Sebastian Castellanos has thought that his best friend and partner Joseph Oda was dead. A knock on the door turned everything upside down.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [Барьеры](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14016231) by [Twenty_One_Grams](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Twenty_One_Grams/pseuds/Twenty_One_Grams). 



> This is a post-Union AU set three years after it in which Kidman has never told Sebastian Joseph was alive.
> 
> And my first work written in English ever, yay. Well, actually I decided to translate my own work originally written in my native language (Russian) to English because why the hell not, my friends encouraged me. The total word count is ~50k. It's a rather loose translation, though, since I'm making changes and adjusting it as I go so it fits the flow of an English narrative better. But those are perks of translating your own stuff - you can do whatever the hell you want with it ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> I apologise for any possible mistakes, especially the ones in the punctuation department. There is a gaping hole in my education and it's called "how the hell does one comma in English."
> 
> Enjoy the ride, folks, I hope you'll like it!

Who would’ve thought that a simple task of opening your eyes could prove to be so goddamn difficult.

Sebastian groaned, rolled onto his stomach and grabbed the pillow, burying his face in it. He felt incredibly warm and perfectly comfortable. And had absolutely no desire to move even an inch. First real day off in two weeks deserved a little lounging around, didn’t it?

Hugging his pillow even tighter, Sebastian decided that yes, it was very well deserved, and cocooned himself into the blankets. He was determined to spend next couple hours just like this, wrapped tightly in the welcoming warmth of one of the greatest humanity’s inventions, until a peculiar smell reached his nostrils. Sebastian shifted a little, sniffing the air. Yeah, it was coffee alright, but in this house coffee never started brewing without his direct involvement.

Well, that was interesting.

A familiar smell and a quick glance at the clock were enough for Sebastian to practically jump out of the bed. Letting yourself rest on the weekend was one thing, sleeping in until noon was another. Another bad, irresponsible thing. When did he even go to bed last night? About nine? Has he slept for fifteen hours straight? What the hell, he wasn’t even that tired.

The bathroom mirror disagreed. Sebastian scratched his chin and winced. He was spotting very prominent eyebags and his beard was practically begging to be _at least_ trimmed. He despised the process, though, and always tried to postpone it for as long as possible. One more day wouldn’t hurt anybody. There was freshly brewed coffee in the kitchen. Letting it get cold while he fought an unfair battle with his razor would be a crime, and Sebastian wasn’t about to commit one.

He washed his face, quickly brushed his teeth and climbed into the lazy day sweatpants — baggy and comfy, just the way he liked them. On his way to the kitchen Sebastian stretched with gusto, hearing his joints crack. He always liked the feeling, although that sweet smell coming from the kitchen was even more pleasant. He followed it like a trail of breadcrumbs.

“Daddy!”

Suddenly, a small cannonball launched itself into Sebastian’s gut and captured him in an iron grip. He didn’t even struggle, smiling and ruffling his daughter’s hair instead.

“Good morning, kitten. Does my nose deceive me, or did you make coffee?”

“I did!” Lily was practically beaming with happiness. “You’ve been sleeping for _sooo_ long. So, I made some breakfast as well.”

“Wow. Great way to put your old man to shame, Lilz.”

“I try.” Lily winked playfully and finally released Sebastian from her iron grip, freeing the way to the kitchen.

The sight of a carefully laid out omelette with bacon and a huge mug filled to the brim with dark, strong coffee made Sebastian’s mouth water. He took his place at the table and Lily flopped onto her chair across from him. Her plate was full as well, which meant she hasn’t eaten breakfast either, waiting for her father to join the feast. That thought warmed Sebastian’s heart more that any blanket could.

“I hope you didn’t follow my lead and got up _way_ earlier than noon,” Sebastian said, pointing his fork with a slice of omelette pitched on it at Lily, “otherwise I’ll be forced to throw my Best Dad mug away.”

“You don’t have a Best Dad mug,” Lily shot back, “so your argument is invalid.”

“Well, you got me here,” Sebastian smiled. “Can’t fool _you_ , young lady.”

“Did you forget I’m a daughter of two police detectives?” Lily snorted and sipped on her orange juice, hiding her mischievous smile behind the glass.

“No, you’re a daughter who knows what her dad has in the kitchen. This omelette is to die for, buy the way. Thank you, sweetheart.”

“Try the coffee.” Lily pointed at Sebastian’s still untouched mug. “Just keep in mind I’ve never tried making it before, so don’t blame me if you get an upset stomach afterwards.”

“Well, that’s reassuring.” Sebastian chuckled, but rushed to do his daughter’s bidding. He brought the mug to his lips, took a good sip… and regretted it instantly. He desperately tried to hold his cough back, but failed miserably. It was honestly the worst brew he has ever tasted.

“Aw… gh… awesome,” Sebastian croaked, desperately trying to clear his throat, and smiled a very strained smile. “It just… went the wrong way. Ahem.”

“That bad, ha?” Lily crossed her arms over her chest and sat back on the chair, narrowing her eyes suspiciously.

“It’s absolutely horrible.” Sebastian confessed. “It tastes like mud.”

“Dang it!” Lily sighed. “Guess I didn’t have to put half of the bean pack in after all.”

“You don’t say…”

Coffee was atrocious, omelette was amazing, warm spring sunlight was shining into the room through the loosely shut curtains and right into Sebastian’s face. There was a small stack of unwashed dishes in the sink and not nearly enough food in the cat bowl, but none of it mattered much. Not when Lily was smiling a bright smile and chattering about school stuff, her features relaxed.

Three years ago, Sebastian had put his newfound daughter on the passenger sit, looked into her eyes and couldn’t believe they would ever be alright again. That they wouldn't have to hide and constantly switch towns. That they would be able to buy an apartment and get a cat.

But they somehow were, and sometimes Sebastian still doubted that it wasn’t all just a dream.

He, Lily and Kidman were the only people who managed to get out of Mobius’ grip alive. There wasn’t anybody else left except old pictures and empty graves.

Whenever Sebastian thought about it, his heart started to ache. He tried to do it as little as possible. With each passing month he allowed himself to remember Myra’s warm smile, Joseph’s constant nagging and Connelly’s contagious laughter less and less. And he got used to it. He hasn’t had nightmares for a year. His life wasn’t inside his head anymore; it was here, right in front of him.

It had a beautiful smile and was growing up way too fast for his liking.

The sound of a doorbell stopped Lily’s chatter and Sebastian’s thoughts to a halt. It was too sudden, too loud and sharp, too… wrong. Sebastian’s stomach turned with apprehension and weird, unintelligible agitation.

“Are you expecting anybody?” Sebastian asked even though he already knew the answer. Lily shook her head and furrowed her brow, confirming his suspicions.

“Okay, I’m gonna go check it out. You stay here, alright, sweety?”

She nodded silently.

One of the many guns hidden throughout the apartment was in a hallway drawer, stuffed deep inside and covered with papers. It was easy to pick it up, even easier to hide it behind his back in case it turned out to be neighbors borrowing sugar.

Sebastian didn’t see anybody through the peephole, but he was confident their visitor hasn’t left. They must’ve specifically stood in a way that would allow them to remain hidden. Clever, but suspicious as hell. Sebastian gripped his gun tighter, not turning the safety off just yet. He opened the door slowly, carefully, but as though nothing unusual was happening, not about to show his anxiety to the person waiting outside.

Their unexpected guest was standing a bit to the side, leaning on the wall, and one glance at him made Sebastian’s heart sink and bile rise to his throat. Suddenly there wasn’t enough air and it felt like somebody twisted a knife in his gut, opening an old seemingly healed wound that came apart at the seams in a matter of seconds. It hurt, it stung, and it made him want to crawl out of his own skin.

Instead, Sebastian grabbed this all too familiar stranger by the collar, dragged him inside the apartment and pressed him to the door, hard, not a single opportunity to break free. He pressed the barrel of his gun under the man’s chin, so hard it was sure to leave marks. Safety off this time. Sebastian’s gaze and thoughts were clouded by something dark red and angry. Something dangerous, struggling to free itself from the confines of his flesh and wreak destruction on the person who dared to desecrate something so dear to him.

“Who the fuck are you,” Sebastian hissed through gritted teeth, “and why the hell did you think coming here with _his_ face was a good idea? You got a death wish, pal?”

“S—Seb, come down, please,” the man raised his hands, palms open. He was clearly panicking, and that made Sebastian smirk. The bastard deserved to be scared. Deserved to be tortured in hundreds, thousands of ways because it was impossible to look at him without feeling angry fire spread through the veins, sip into the skin. Sebastian hasn’t felt like this for three years.

Three years since Union.

“Don’t you dare call me that. You as much as utter my name, you’re fucking dead, ya hear me?” Sebastian pressed his gun harder into the man’s flesh. “Oh, and you’re also dead if you don’t tell me right here and now who the fuck are you and what the hell you’re doing here. Don’t think I won’t blow your brains out, bud.”

“Listen to me, please! It’s me, it’s just me, it’s… Joseph.”

“Joseph is dead!” Sebastian shouted, hitting the door with his free hand so hard the skin scraped. It stung, but he didn’t care. “He died six years ago, and you are just some fucking scumbag who looks like him. Fucking Mobius. I thought I wiped you shitheads out.”

“How do you think it’s possible?!” This make-believe Joseph asked, voice strained and panicked but with a hint of fury. Seemed like this guy had a death wish after all. “Plastic surgery? Why would anybody do that? Do you even hear yourself?”

“I have no idea how that’s possible,” Sebastian hissed, “but I do know that my partner has been dead for many, many years.”

“You thought Lily was dead too.” An all too familiar gloved hand touched Sebastian’s wrist — gently, carefully. “But you were wrong. You didn’t see the body, Seb. It really is me. Please, tell me how I can prove this to you.”

The soft touch was uncomfortably, painfully familiar. So was the guy’s sad, worried expression. Slightly grown hair that curled at the edges and barely noticeable crow’s feet were new, but the voice and the words it spoke… Doubt, reckless and desperate, creeped into Sebastian’s mind. He wanted to allow himself to believe this man so badly it hurt, but he couldn’t just let it happen. He simply couldn’t.

“What was the first thing Joseph said to me after being assigned my partner?”

Not “you”. Not yet. Too early. Too scary.

“Seriously? Want to make me feel bad again?” The man softly laughed, a familiar sound that made Sebastian’s skin crawl. “Well, alright then. _Ohmygod-im-so-sorry-please-let-me-pay-for-it_. I wanted to sink through the floor because I bumped into my newly assigned higher ranked partner in the doorway and spilled my tea all over his white dress shirt. It was green with honey and you were never able to get that stain off.”

Sebastian took a step back. Lowered his gun, swallowed a lump in his throat.

“I ended up never paying for the shirt, though. You just laughed it off and told me not to sweat it but proceeded to mock me for the next month. Myra joined you too. And rather happily, if I say so myself.”

Sebastian’s grip on Joseph was probably so tight it could break bones. Joseph probably couldn’t breathe properly. Sebastian probably should’ve cared, but he didn’t. Joseph was warm and close and hugging him back and alive. God, Joseph was _alive_.

“What the hell, Jo, what the actual hell.” Sebastian mumbled into his neck. “I thought you were… you were… Goddammit, where have you been for six years?!”

“It’s a long story,” Joseph wheezed out, “and the one I won’t be able to tell if you strangle me to death.”

That made Sebastian let go, step back, put his gun away — finally.

A long time ago, in another life, before Myra disappeared from Crimson and Sebastian disappeared at the bottom of a bottle, Joseph had brought him an absolutely useless, utterly moronic book about dealing with loss. He had muttered awkwardly that he himself thought that those “guides” were complete heresy but hoped that maybe it would help. Yeah, he had called it _heresy_. Not shit, not gibberish. Heresy. Sebastian had laughed so hard his stomach started to ache. Some use had come out of this stupid book after all, even though he tossed it in the trash the same evening. A little later — not in another life, but in the one that still seemed far away — Sebastian really wished somebody would write books about dealing with loss not only of each and every person in your life, but also your mind that you left rotting in the depths of an artificial universe filled with bloodthirsty creatures the only sight of whom could make a man scream.

There were no books about what to say to your partner you have thought dead for six years either, but no complaints there. A perfect chance to take over the niche. That is if Sebastian could force himself to say something instead of blatantly staring at Joseph’s face.

Would Joseph vanish if he reached out to touch him again?

“It suits you,” Joseph said quietly, awkwardly running his hand over his own chin. Sebastian furrowed his brow. “Your beard. You grew a beard. It… it looks good.”

“Ah. Yeah. Thanks. It’s… I’ve had it for a while.” It was short, empty. Awkward.

The silence between them was so prominent Sebastian could hear the clock ticking in the kitchen. The air was heavy with it. Joseph was faltering, still standing in front of the door he was pressed into just a minute ago, his gaze shifting from side to side. He was slightly blushing, his cheekbones and neck a bleak red, and Sebastian couldn’t tell if it was worry or traces of fear of being shot in the jaw.

Sebastian’s daughter came back to him from the dead. Now his best friend has done the same, but Sebastian still had no idea how to react. His brain short-circuited, thoughts slow and heavy. It was so hard to believe what was happening that Sebastian felt the urge to simply shake Joseph to make sure he was real.

Somebody had to invent some kind of etiquette for that type of thing. But since a specific set of rules hasn’t existed yet, Sebastian decided to go his own way about it. He absent-mindedly waved his hand toward the kitchen, smiled and asked a universal awkward situation question.

“You hungry?”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updating after 6 months? Why the hell not! :D

Joseph wasn’t hungry, but he did follow Sebastian into the kitchen, and now he was sat at the table, gloved hands locked together. It seemed absolutely surreal. Yes, Lily did see Joseph too, so Sebastian could be sure he wasn’t hallucinating, but it was still almost impossible to believe.

Lily recognized Joseph when she saw him. She smiled her wide bright smile, told him how happy she was he wasn’t dead and then galloped away to her room. It was all so surreal that Sebastian couldn’t shake the feeling of being pranked, like there were Mobius’ cameras hidden all over the room, filming everything for their masters’ amusement.

(Sebastian wasn’t that fond of cameras. Not after Union. Lily was the only one who could force him to take a picture of himself, and even that required quite a bit of effort on her part.)

Joseph just sat there without saying a word, and it made Sebastian’s fingers itch. Joseph came here himself. Came back after six years of letting everyone think he was dead. Sebastian was at his _funeral_ , for Christ’s sake, he watched them lower an empty coffin into the ground and listened to an equally empty speech about what a brilliant detective Joseph had been. A brilliant detective who died a hero, even though nobody knew how exactly he died. They asked Sebastian to give a speech too, but he told them to fuck off and spent the whole thing in the back row with his fingers wrapped around a flask inside his pocket, torn apart by the dull feeling of unfairness and incompletion.

Joseph had let it all happen and was now simply sitting at Sebastian’s table, not saying a word and looking guilty as hell.

“Why did you come back?”

Joseph shuddered and swallowed nervously. Was he afraid? Or, perhaps, could sense the rage that was practically radiating from Sebastian?

“I need your help.” Joseph finally said, his voice low and quiet.

“Ah,” Sebastian answered through the gritted teeth. “You came back because you need my _help_. Not because you thought that, I dunno, you best friend deserves to know you’re not _fucking dead_?”

“Sebastian.” Joseph whinced and straightened his perfectly level glasses. “It’s not what you think, okay? During all this time, I… I was trying to fix everything, I was, I… I honestly tried, but I… I couldn’t... “

“Can’t even come up with a decent fucking excuse. Cat got your tongue?”

Sebastian flopped into the chair and crossed his arms across his chest. He really needed a smoke right now, but he quit about a month ago, and even before that he had stopped smoking inside the apartment — because of Lily. He would always force himself to go outside, even during winter, when his fingers got so cold he felt like they were going to fall off and the lighter always refused to work the first time around.

“Well, you were always the one who came up with… stuff, weren’t you? When interrogating suspects? They all _loved_ being given a mouthful by a cop…”

“If you keep trying to shift me off topic, I’ll give _you_ a mouthful.”

“That obvious?” Joseph smiled weakly, making Sebastian chuckle dryly.

“Yeah, pretty much.”

“I guess I forgot you are… were a detective. That I was one myself,” Joseph’s voice trembled, and Sebastian should’ve probably felt guilty, but he didn’t.

“One has to be absolutely dense to not get your little stunt,” he started, “and you know perfectly well there’s no such thing as a former detective. So stop pissing me off and explain why the fuck did you let me think your corpse has long rotten somewhere in Mobius’ basement.”

Joseph’s silence pissed Sebastian off as much as anything, but when he did finally answer, he wished Joseph has kept his mouth shut.

“Maybe because you didn’t even try to look for me?”

Joseph managed to look Sebastian straight in the eye for the first time since he entered the apartment. His jaw tightened, and Sebastian could hear the leather of his gloves stretching when he clenched his fingers into a first, could feel his own hands starting to shake with quiet anger.

“What was that?” Sebastian asked, his voice stretched.

“I said that maybe you though I’ve been dead because you didn’t even try to look for me,” Joseph spat out, “or find out what happened to me, for that matter. You didn’t come back fo me. You just… gave up. Like always. Gave up and went to drown your unimaginable sorrow in a bottle. Like always.”

Joseph actually started screaming by the end of his little speech, and Sebastian stood up so quickly his chair flew back, hitting his palms on the table. He could feel the anger boiling inside, rushing the adrenaline through his veins. Joseph had no right to speak to him this way, no fucking right, not after the shit he’d pulled.

“Don’t even try to make this my fault!” Sebastian growled. “I saw Kidman shoot you with my own eyes. She shot you in the heart, dammit! Right. In. Your. Fucking. Heart!”

“And did you see the body?!” Joseph stood up too, his glasses definitely needing some straightening now. “Huh, Seb? You say there’s no such thing as a former detective, but would a proper detective decide somebody was dead without seeing their goddamn body?!”

“You weren’t in the bathtub! You weren’t… anywhere!”

“Oh, and you spent so much time looking!”

Sebastian could count how many times he saw Joseph lose it by the fingers of his hand. This was the third one (the first time Joseph took a case they were working too close to heart; after the second one he reported Sebastian to Internal Affairs). His cheeks were flushes, his hair messed up and all about the place, his lips slightly shaking. Joseph looked exposed, vulnerable, desperate, but Sebastian wasn’t about to give in. He had nothing to be ashamed of.

He didn’t, right?

“I did, actually.” Sebastian hissed. “I just didn’t imagine you could’ve simply come to me this whole time. To, I dunno, tell me you were kind of _alive_.”

“Do you really think I wouldn't have come if I could?!”

“Yeah? Okay, alright, great. What stopped you then?”

Joseph opened his mouth as if to say something, but nothing came out. He cocked his head, turning his gaze away and pressing his lips tight together. Sebastian felt his anger rushing out of him in one swift motion, leaving behind nothing but aching emptiness in his chest.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” he said quietly. His voice said more than he would like about what he was feeling, but it hurt more that he would like too.

“Sebastian, I…” 

“You’re leaving,” Sebastian said quietly, his words sharp like a knife, almost slicing skin, Joseph’s face twisting in pain.

“Seb, wait, I…” 

“I’m not gonna leave my daughter with somebody I can’t trust. And how the hell am I supposed to trust you if you can’t even tell me where the fuck you’ve been all this time?!”

It was dangerous. Dangerous to even let him in, let him see Lily, that she is alive, that she can be taken again. And taking her or even worse… That could very well be what Joseph was after. People change. People change, people become assholes, people betray each other. How was Sebastian to know that a person who’s been closest to him for almost ten years wasn’t going to do the same?

Those thoughts… They made him want to scream, scream and kick, grab Joseph by the shoulders and _beat_ the truth out of him, turn his face into a bloody mess just so that Joseph would tell him it was alright. That there was nothing to worry about, that Sebastian was riling himself up over nothing, that he was still that same uptight idiot whom he loved so much. The same one that used to knock unfinished whiskey bottles out of Sebastian’s hand and tried to make him like those disgusting rice balls with raw fish on top.

The clock’s ticking was so loud it made Sebastian's ears ache. A second passed, two, three, twenty, and Joseph still wasn’t saying a thing, his eyes trained on the floor, and that was it. There was nothing else Sebastian could do. He wasn’t going to wait any longer, wasn’t going to entertain himself with false hope. He’d gotten smarter than that a long, long time ago.

If he had to resort to physically forcing Joseph out of his apartment, he would do it, even at the cost of ripping his own heart to shreds.

Sebastian straightened his shoulders, took a deep breath and took a step towards Joseph. The first one, the second, the third, and then the last. Not that hard, right?

Right..?

“I found Ruvik.”

Sebastian’s hand, raised to grip Joseph’s shoulder, stilled in the air.

**Author's Note:**

> Please feel free to point out any mistakes you've encountered, I'll be happy to fix them.


End file.
